


he told the girl on the train about gavin

by StormSeason



Category: Original Work
Genre: ADHD Character, Bisexual Character, Fantasy Religion, First Meetings, Fluff, Multi, Nonbinary Character, Original Universe, Other, Pansexual Character, Polyamory, Road Trips, kinda? eventually!
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-26
Updated: 2020-11-26
Packaged: 2021-03-10 03:28:04
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,769
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27666793
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/StormSeason/pseuds/StormSeason
Summary: Jade, in Trystan’s mind, would become inextricably associated with sunlight, flowers, and the hills of Cardea in the spring and summer. Things with Gavin, more often than not, were too goddamned serious.
Relationships: Gavin Johansen/Trystan Morek, Trystan Morek/Jade Harris
Kudos: 4





	he told the girl on the train about gavin

**Author's Note:**

> There are discussions of homophobia as well as underage sex (in the form of two adults laughing about things they did when younger).

He told the girl on the train about Gavin. He’d been on his way across the border, and they’d sat in the open cargo train, chugging along through the countryside, and he’d told her things he’d never told anyone before. Trystan avoided talking about Gavin with most people he knew, but when amongst strangers or acquaintances, he would mention “my friend” this, and “I have a friend who” that, and it was almost always Gavin.

The girl on the train, whose name was Jade, caught onto it right away. “Is that your friend you were just visiting?”

Letting the little truths of that relationship into the light was a lot like talking to her in general; open, bright, and free. Sometimes his friendship with Gavin felt so much like a heavy suitcase of secrets and solemnity, to be guarded and appreciated from a safe distance.

Jade, in Trystan’s mind, would become inextricably associated with sunlight, flowers, and the hills of Cardea in the spring and summer. Things with Gavin, more often than not, were too goddamned serious.

The first thing he noticed about her were her clothes, pastel colors and lace, an ankle length skirt and a modest sleeveless top that revealed hundreds of freckles on her arms and shoulders. Her shaggy copper pixie cut never once was neat, always a mess from the wind, and she gave no care to it.

That first time they met, on a thirteen hour ride through nowhere, they told each other entirely too much, the way that you sometimes can with strangers. That, and Jade was eager to share.

“Romisist?” Trystan guessed, after they’d been talking for a while.

“What gave it away?” She teased, shaking out her long skirt. “Yeah, I mostly grew up outside of the community but my aunt was really religious and I lived with her for a few years. People only think I’m actually Romisist if they don’t know anything about ‘em. Good Romisist girls wear long sleeves, too.”

“I’ve only met a few who left their community,” Trystan admitted. “I don’t know much.”

“That’s how it goes! Most Romisists never meet anyone from outside the town they grew up in.” She gave the most dramatic eye roll physically possible. “I woulda fucking _died_ if I’d stayed there. My old girlfriend and I talked about running away together, but she decided to just squash herself down and fit back in. Try to forget she’s a lesbian and devote herself to a life of purity.” Jade made a face. “I hope she’s happy. I don’t see how she could be, but at least her soul isn’t gonna get snatched by the Glaowrich, right?”

“I don’t know, is it?”

Jade gave a huge shrug. “Fuck if I know. I sure hope not, or I’m screwed!”

Trystan would have been content to listen to her ramble on, but she had questions for him too, and she reacted to his stories with the same rampant emotion and enthusiasm which she told her own. What he did in J’Kyris never came up, but they compared their experiences having grown up in restrictive, repressive environments in Cardea, and then running off to grand adventures.

He laughed aloud when she told him she’d suspected from the beginning he wasn’t straight, and had mentioned her past girlfriend in the hopes of getting him to open up. “When I was fourteen I would have been _mortified_ by the idea that strangers would clock me instantly. But even when I tried my best I was terrible at convincing the boys there wasn’t something queer about me. It’s funny now.”

It was different telling her these things than it was telling Gavin. Gavin might as well have popped out of the womb bearded and cluelessly masculine. Even when he was waving his hands and fretting like a mother hen, he did it in a way that somehow made men want to have a beer with him and ask if he had a wife and kids.

“No one ever really thought I was gay, I was just a dirty tomboy brat. I used to eat bugs to try an’ win the boys over.”

“Maybe that’s what I should’ve done.” He didn’t ask outright if she was only into girls, but he was very interested to find out.

“Some of the boys thought it was cool. Mostly it made the other girls and adults freak out which was also attention, so I took it.”

When Gavin talked about his childhood, it was with bittersweet nostalgia. Jade and Trystan laughed about everything that had made them miserable, without it feeling at all tragic. Jade mentioned her mother only briefly, not giving any concrete clues as to why that situation had been bad enough to run away from with no regrets, preferring to focus on making fun of her past self.

“I don’t blame the teachers and kids for not liking me. I was such a little shit! I was terrible at all the learning stuff, yeah, but I had an awful temper and got in fights with everyone about everything.” She flashed Trystan a grin. “I got my recesses taken away for good after I punched Jenny Mathers in the face and she lost a tooth. It was pro’lly about to fall out anyway.”

“Damn, you’re vicious,” Trystan remarked, grinning back at her.

“Pfft. I’m nicer now.”

He did not tell her that the first time he’d used magic to fight had also been at recess, and that the other kids had been scared of him afterward. Instead he told her about Gravers, his long time rival, and how once they’d ended up making out in a janitor’s closet in Gravers’ final year of school.

“We were hiding in there for some reason, I forgot what trouble we were up to. I sure as hell didn’t go into that closet with any kind of interest in him. We didn’t know how to touch each other without fighting, but we were squashed together in this tiny dusty little space trying to keep quiet while a class walked by the hallway outside. I just kissed him because I knew it would piss him off, and it went from there. I went down on him and then spit his cum in his face and walked out.”

Jade crowed in delight, smacking her hand on the side of the railcar. “Oh my god, that is the _best_!”

Trystan grinned, equally delighted by her reaction. “I might have peaked at sixteen, honestly. None of my stories are better than that one.”

His face hurt from smiling. She made him feel like if he jumped off the train he could fly. The doubts in his head, which usually took on the voice of Constance or sometimes Gavin, reminded him how foolish and dangerous it was to get attached to someone this quickly. Gavin, Constance, and his own mind could all go fuck themselves. He was probably never going to see her again, and there was no reason he couldn’t feel and think whatever he wanted, all the way out here.

The temperature dropped dramatically when the sun set, and the wind only made it worse. They hunkered down side by side, shielded from most of the wind by the metal walls, and Jade complained loudly about the cold while she dug through her suitcase to find her blanket, despite turning down Trystan’s offer of his own jacket.

“Someone stole my coat - did I mention that? What kind of bitch steals someone’s coat? At least winter’s over.” She wrapped herself in a thick wool blanket and settled back down next to him against the wall, sitting much closer this time.

She glanced at him for approval and he scooted closer, so she tossed some of the end of the blanket over his legs and rested her head on his shoulder. He hummed a happy sort of laugh, and held still, hoping desperately for her to stay. The casual, friendly intimacy of it felt like taking the first bites of a warm meal.

With Gavin, this feeling was always more complicated. Trystan was still honored that Gavin trusted and liked him enough to want to touch him at all, though he downplayed it and turned it into a joke. Gavin would probably be somewhat weirded out by how much Trystan reveled in and craved his affection.

His mind wandered off in the long silence, away from Jade and back to cold nights in the park with Gavin, watching him a match to relight his cigarette and throwing the shadows off his face briefly. One time Trystan had playfully snatched his cigarette away, laughing. Their faces had been very close for a second, and he’d wanted to kiss so many people in his life, but somehow this was different, and Trystan still didn’t dare think about why. They hadn’t kissed, of course. Gavin had moved away awkwardly, breaking the moment, and Trystan had passed back his cigarette.

“Whatcha thinkin’ ‘bout?” Jade asked, snatching Trystan from his reminiscing.

“Nothing,” he lied reflexively, his voice dropping to a casual drawl, but after glancing at her face, he said, “The friend I was visiting.”

Jade nudged him in the side. “You think about him a lot, huh?” She gave him an innocent smile — she clearly knew how adorable that was — and rested her head back on his shoulder. “Tell me about your ‘friend.’ Gavin, right? What’s he do? He doesn’t travel like us, does he?”

“He has an apartment he’s been in for years, and he works in a library. And yes, _friend_. No one in their right mind would want to date Gavin.”

“Who said anything about dating?”

“You’re right, you are a little shit.”

She snickered. “It’s cool you got someone like that. I make friends fast but I don’t keep any of ‘em for very long.”

They slept close together that night, her warm body pressed up against his front, his nose brushing against her neck, inhaling her floral shampoo and a hint of sweat and dust.

He forgot to think about Gavin after that. He’d been afraid of the opposite, that he would spend the next week replaying in his mind every moment of their last visit, sorting through every memory he had where Gavin had given him that fond smile which made something in Trystan’s stomach curl tighter, trying to pinpoint the first time that had happened.

He’d come out here to run away from his thoughts and feelings — not just about Gavin, but about everything else, too — and it worked shockingly well. Jade was a great distraction.


End file.
